


In Keeping With Tradition

by raendown



Series: Uchiha Courting Rituals [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: BOTH, M/M, Uchiha Are Weird, but they attract a lot of Senjus, it's both, so who's the true weird ones here?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-06-03
Packaged: 2019-05-17 20:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14838626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raendown/pseuds/raendown
Summary: After watching his brother's - unintentional - success, Hashirama sets out to catch an Uchiha of his very own.





	In Keeping With Tradition

**Author's Note:**

> Some of this may not make sense unless you've read it's predecessor [Love Done Right](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14741729/chapters/34080872).

Using every iota of the stealth abilities that he had carefully honed over the past four days, Hashirama peeked his head around the corner to observe his target, noting happily that Izuna appeared to be in a cheerful mood this morning. Hashirama’s day was always brighter when he had a chance to see Izuna’s handsome smile. Without evening realizing it he was already mimicking the expression from the shadows where he hid, mentally running over his plan one more time.

That hours long discussion he’d been forced to have with Madara had paid off in more than one way and his friend wasn’t the only one who had come away with some fascinating new information to implement. Now that he knew about the – admittedly strange – courtship rituals of the Uchiha, Hashirama knew the perfect way to finally bring something important to Izuna’s attention. Namely: the fact that Hashirama was madly in love with him.

It wasn’t as though he hadn’t tried to say so before. Many a plan had gone awry or even unnoticed over the last few months and now it all made sense why. How was Izuna supposed to know that Hashirama cared for him that way when Hashirama treated him so gently? If violence was expected to get his point across, well, there were perks to being blessed with high level healing skills and massive chakra reserves.

Seeing his target approach, Hashirama hummed tunelessly under his breath as he slipped around the corner and stepped out in to the sunlight at just the right moment, timing his movements perfectly to ‘accidentally’ cause the unsuspecting Izuna to walk straight in to his chest.

“Whoops!” he chirped. “My apologies, Izuna, but I didn’t see you there.”

“That’s fine,” Izuna said, looking up at him with a friendly smile. Hashirama beamed.

“So kind! You’re exactly the sort of person we need to keep peace in the village!”

Well known for his tendency to hug everyone that stood still for more than ten seconds, Hashirama shamelessly took advantage of his own reputation to sweep his arms around Izuna’s trim form and draw the man in to a tight embrace. A very tight embrace, in fact. Hoping against hope that this, of all things, would get his point across, Hashirama constricted his arms just passed the point where he usually reminded himself to be careful of other people’s breakability.

Then he stopped with a false gasp of surprise when several cracking noises rent the air. When he set Izuna back on his feet and stepped away the younger man looked more dazed than in pain. Considering the stories his brother had told him about the first few days of Madara’s unusual courtship, Hashirama chose to take that as a good sign. Besides, dazed was much easier for him to watch than seeing his loved ones in pain.

Izuna looked up at him with wide eyes and Hashirama politely waited for him to say something.

“You…you broke my ribs…”

“Ah. So I did. Shall I heal them for you as well?”

“Okay?” If it were possible for a human to physically have stars in their eyes, Izuna would have sprouted a few in that moment.

Doing his best to remain calm and not show too much of how smug he was feeling, Hashirama gathered healing chakra to his hands and motioned for Izuna to follow him in to the empty room they very conveniently happened to be standing outside of. As soon as they were alone with the door shut behind them, Hashirama fixed Izuna with a look he would deny having at all, let along having practiced in the mirror: his come hither look.

“I’ll need you to open your robes so I can get to the injury,” he said quietly.

“Nnggg?” Izuna swallowed visibly, sending tingles rushing through Hashirama’s limbs. “A-alright.”

Strictly speaking, having direct contact with the wound wasn’t exactly necessary. It would have been just as easy for him to heal the cracked ribs from outside of the other’s robes since chakra healing was done mostly with the inner senses. He wasn’t about to mention that, however, as Izuna loosened his obi and gingerly pulled both arms out of his sleeves, leaving the upper half of his traditional Uchiha robe hanging from the waist.

Just as Hashirama began to question whether he could hold himself together in the face of so much exposed skin, he remembered that he was doing this in an effort to convince Izuna to see him as a potential partner and it made him wonder why he wasn’t being more blatant about his desires. What was the point in this if the younger man didn’t get the proper hints? With that in mind Hashirama resisted his first instinct to hide the hungry expression which fell over his face, allowing the other man to see the way he licked his lips absently and openly admired the toned chest revealed to him. As pretty as Izuna was fully dressed, he made an even better sight half out of his clothing.

Embarrassingly, both of them released quiet squeaking noises when their skin brushed together, although Hashirama managed to keep his wits about him together enough to press one palm flat to his patient’s chest for a diagnostic scan. Izuna merely stood there while his face slowly turned red. As suspected, he turned out to have several cracked ribs which Hashirama was more than happy to set about healing straight away. He was also more than happy to shamelessly caress the area under his hand as he worked. Pandering to the Uchiha courtship rituals was all well and good considering who he was trying to flirt with but that didn’t mean he couldn’t slip in a few of his own moves as well.

Once Izuna’s ribs were all set back to how they should be, uncracked and no longer causing pain, Hashirama very slowly retracted his hand, fingertips lingering in the grooves of a very impressive set of abs.

“All better,” he announced brightly. “I suppose I don’t know my own strength sometimes.”

“Uh-huh…”

“I’m meant to be somewhere right now so I should get going. Have a good rest of your day Izu-kun!”

Giving a wave and a smile, Hashirama stepped to one side and walked away as casually as he was able to with such heady waves of adrenaline rushing through his veins. He knew that dazed look; it was the same look Madara had worn after his friend had those first couple of encounters with Tobirama which began their relationship.

Amazing, all it had taken was breaking his ribs and suddenly it seemed Izuna could _see_ him in the way he’d been hoping to be seen for quite some time now. Uchiha were odd – and yet, so loveable.

The next few days were strange. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary happened and yet in a way that was sort of what made them so strange. From what he knew of the Uchiha after his conversation with Madara, Hashirama rather thought Izuna might have come to see him by now. Even if he were not entirely certain that he wished to pursue someone like Hashirama, even were he not bearing the ‘first courting gift’, it seemed peculiar that he didn’t show any interest in exploring the option. In fact, it felt as though Izuna were avoiding him.

It took perhaps three days for Hashirama to decide that this simply wouldn’t do. How was he supposed to convince Izuna to date him if the younger man wouldn’t even spend five minutes around him outside of clan meetings or council business?

Trying to remember that he also wouldn’t want to make Izuna uncomfortable if his advances were truly unwanted, Hashirama leapt on the first work related excuse he could find which would take him to Izuna’s private office several days after the rib-cracking incident. He did notice the squirming which started up the moment he stepped in to the room but it was a little hard to tell if it was because he was making Izuna uncomfortable or if Izuna was trying to, say, hold in sudden romantic feelings he was unsure of.

“Izu-kun”–the man in question twitched noticeably at the nickname–“someone sent your copy of the security proposals to me. I thought you might want this back since you mentioned there were still a few adjustments you wished to make.”

“A-ah. Thank you Hokage-sama.”

“No need to be so formal! We’re all friends here; you can call me Hashirama!”

“Oh. Thanks. Uh, again.”

Beaming, Hashirama turned to leave but stopped as though some new thought had only just occurred to him. It hadn’t, he’d been thinking about this all morning but there was no need to scare off his intended by admitting that.

“We should get to know each other better if you still feel the need to be so formal. Are you busy this afternoon? I have some free time just after lunch and it might be fun to have a spar, wouldn’t you say?” Achieving just the right mix of suggestive leer and innocent smile was hard but he managed, thrilled to see how well it distracted the other man.

“Sure. Yeah. Okay.”

“Excellent! It’s a date!”

Izuna twitched again at his choice of words but Hashirama was already gone, tottering down the hall with a smile and humming a cheerful tune. The day had only barely begun and already it was shaping up to be a good one. His schedule was entirely free of meetings, his brother was tucked away in a corner somewhere with Madara where they couldn’t yell at him to stay focused, and after lunch he was going to go hunt himself a husband.

With such important plans dangling before him like a particularly tempting treat, noon seemed to take forever to arrive. Hashirama distracted his thoughts by throwing himself in to the work on his desk, for once not even needing one of his loved ones to stand over him like the slave drivers they all were. A quarter of an hour before his usual lunch break was scheduled he reached for something else to work on only to find that he’d finished it all without even meaning to. Once he realized what he’d done he had to bend his head and chuckle at the thought of how Tobirama was going to react when he came in tomorrow, most likely prepared to whine about how nothing ever got done in his absence, only to find that it had _all_ gotten done.

After the laughter faded he was left with little to do but twiddle his thumbs unless he wanted to actually get ahead with budget proposals that didn’t require attention until next week or draft a few letters that wouldn’t need sending for several more days. None of that really sounded appealing, though, so after checking to make sure the coast was clear he slipped out of his office early and made his way down to the lower floors where Mito sat primly behind a desk, calmly explaining to a tired looking man why his mission report form was unacceptable.

“How’s the most beautiful, wonderful–”

“What do you need, Hashirama?” She didn’t even bother to look away from the man she was reprimanding, staring him down with a calm expression which obviously terrified more than if she had peeled back her lips and bared her teeth like an animal.

“Can’t a man just visit his precious people without having a reason to?”

“You have that expression you always make when you want something. Just tell me what it is and I can decide whether or not I feel generous today.”

Popping up from behind a nearby filing cabinet, Touka cackled. “More likely than you think. She’s been having a lot of fun scaring all the chūnin coming back in from border patrols.” His cousin directed a smirk at the woman now primly handing a pen over to her shaking victim. “I should ask you to cover me for desk duty more often.” Hashirama frowned at her as she popped back down behind the filing cabinet.

“What are you doing back there?”

“Do you really want to know?” she asked, peeking out once more. That was when he noticed she had chakra wire bundled in her hands and a handful of what looked like Tobirama’s explosive tags sticking out of her pocket, the ones that were still labelled as ‘experimental, not for common usage’.

“Um…no. No I don’t think I do. Just don’t let Brother know that I saw you doing something, okay?” She nodded perfunctorily and Hashirama did his best to forget the vicious light in her eyes as she went back to whatever nefarious deed she was up to. Instead he turned to Mito and gave her his best smile.

She sent the chūnin away with a dismissive wave of her hand before turning to Hashirama. “What do you want?”

“I might have told someone that I had a bit of free time after lunch when I’m really supposed to be in my office for public hours. What would it take to convince you to cover _my_ desk duty for a bit?” He fidgeted, watching her eyes narrow suspiciously before widening with a tiny smile.

“Do I get three guesses who it is you’d like to spend some time with?”

Hashirama nearly wriggled on the spot with excitement and that was all the answer she needed.

“Finally worked up the courage to do something about Izuna, hm? Good for you. If that’s the case then I would be more than happy to sit in your office and play ‘interim hokage’ for a few hours; anything to stop the mooning and the secret pining.”

“Hey!” Hashirama pouted. “I do not _moon_ or _pine_.”

“Yeah you do!” Touka’s voice called out from behind the cabinet. When she stood up her entire torso was strung with chakra wire, explosive tags all woven through at strategic intervals to give her a rather forbidding look. Hashirama twisted his mouth to one side and shook his head.

“Right, whatever you’re up to, I don’t want to be a part of it when you get in trouble. I should probably go. Thanks Mito! You’re amazing!”

“I know,” her voice trailed after him. Hashirama chortled to himself as he trotted off back upstairs.

Amazingly, his lucky day only continued to get better. The moment he sat down in his chair Tobirama stumbled in through the door just a few seconds too late to catch him away from his desk. Madara came trailing behind him with a black eye and a lovesick expression which he quickly covered up upon spotting his best friend.

The three of them stared at each other in silence until Tobirama cleared his throat. Twice. If he didn’t know any better Hashirama would almost say his sibling was acting a little awkward.

“What are you doing here, Anija?” he asked. Hashirama blinked in confusion.

“Um…this is my office?”

“It’s lunch time. You always sneak out as soon as it’s time for lunch.”

Madara inched behind his partner, eyeing the desk intently for whatever reason, and said nothing.

“Oh is it?” Hashirama asked innocently. “I hadn’t noticed. Well then I should go head out. For lunch. And no other reason at all. Just a normal lunch.”

“Sounds good,” Tobirama mumbled. He too was eyeing the desk.

For the second time in less than ten minutes, Hashirama decided that he would much rather not know anything about what was going on. Maybe these two were planning on setting up a prank in his office but if that bought him a little extra time with Izuna then he was willing to deal with whatever happened later. He made his exit almost unnoticed by the two lovers, who seemed to suddenly be standing a lot closer together now, and the moment he closed the door behind himself he felt the shivery feeling of seal wards dropping down around the room.

It was _definitely_ safer not to know. Mito could sort them out when she came upstairs.

Deliberately setting those two out of his mind – as well as Touka and her brand of madness – Hashirama set a course towards Izuna’s office once again with a purposeful stride. He hoped that Izuna was looking forward to this as much as he was. As long as his luck held out for just a little while longer then by the end of their spar he would have landed himself an Uchiha. And he would have done so on purpose, which he could rub in his brother’s face as an extra bonus.

Noon had already emptied the hallways before him as he strolled down a floor and peeked his head around a doorframe to find Izuna with his butt resting against the edge of his desk, staring out the window while he chewed on a thumbnail. Papers were strewn across his desk in every which direction, three pens hidden among the mess, and his free hand was rolling a small wooden ball around the circle of his palm. Hashirama recognized it as the ball he’d stolen from his older brother’s desk and only fiddled with when there was something particularly troubling on his mind. With any luck their spar would be enough to distract him and lift away any fragments of bad mood which might have crept up in the shot time since they had last seen each other.

“Knock knock!” Hashirama stifled a giggle at seeing Izuna jump, spinning around to stare at him with wide eyes.

“Oh Hoka-er-Hashirama! My apologies, I didn’t hear you coming. Aren’t you early?”

“Mn. Tobi and Maddy needed my office for something and I didn’t ask. That just means I have more time to spend with you! If you’re not too busy to take lunch right now?”

“Nnngggg.”

Hashirama wasn’t sure what that noise was supposed to mean. Izuna looked both distressed and embarrassed and he wasn’t really sure how he was meant to interpret that, let alone react to it. Luckily he was spared the trouble; Izuna murmured something about getting nothing done anyway and waved for him to lead the way.

It took a couple of false starts but eventually he was able to pull Izuna in to conversation as they strolled leisurely towards the training grounds, weaving their way around the masses of civilians and shinobi all milling about and trying to decide where to scavenge their midday meal. Mostly they talked about inconsequential things – or at least they might have seemed inconsequential to one of them. Knowing what he did of the Uchiha courting rituals, Hashirama was certain that his companion saw nothing suspicious in his casual questions about favorite flowers or which of the new festivals he most enjoyed of the ones they had established for the citizens of their village.

Several streets passed the rushing hubbub they both paused for a moment to observe Touka when she appeared from nowhere to march on by, covered head to toe in weaponry and explosives. She seemed to be heading towards the Uchiha district and Hashirama wondered if her plans today weren’t all that different from his own. At least Tobirama wouldn’t scold her too hard if she cited courting methods as an excuse for pyrotechnics. He silently wished her good luck before continuing on.

By the time they had wandered slowly all the way to the training fields Izuna looked much less tense, even smiling and tossing around a few jokes. Seeing him like this was a relief; it wasn’t like him to look so down unless there was some truly serious issue bothering him but whatever that issue was, Hashirama knew it would ruin the mood he was going for to ask about it. If Izuna brought it up he would be more than happen to talk about it and maybe help find a solution. Until then he was more excited to put his plans in to action.

“Rules?” he politely offered the honors to his companion after they had both stretched out their muscles. 

“Taijutsu only? We’ve never sparred before; probably best not to start with anything flashy. You can wipe the floor with Aniki so I’m hardly enthusiastic about my own chances here.” Izuna flashed a grin, hands reaching for his blades by habit before deliberately swinging down at his sides.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Hashirama protested. “You’re the only person who’s ever managed to give Tobirama any difficulty on the field and it’s no easy feat besting him in a spar. Especially if you take away my jutsu. That’s sort of necessary to pin him, he’s pretty slippery.”

“He is that.” Izuna chuckled in agreement, no doubt thinking of the many friendly spars he’d had with Tobirama since they made peace, spars which generally ended up with one or both of them gasping on the ground in exhaustion after reaching a stalemate.

“Shall we?”

Both of them were grinning widely as they fell in to stance, Hashirama crooking the fingers of one hand in teasing invitation for his opponent to make the first move. Izuna huffed at him but came forward with his body already twisting in the motions of what would have been a vicious kick had it connected.

Deskwork has apparently taken its toll on Hashirama more than he’d thought as of late. He only just barely managed to block the first few blows before finally responding with a few of his own, quickly falling back in to rhythms so familiar they were practically engraved in his very sense of being. Arms raised to block punches without thought and legs swept out to attack shins before he had consciously noticed they had been left unguarded.

Together the two of them danced back and forth across the grass, each striving for the upper hand, eyes narrowed and sharply watching for a weakness in defense. Dirt showered up with each kick aimed for neck or knee and several times one or the other was forced to bend in interesting ways to avoid painful bruising. It took nearly a full eight minutes before Hashirama finally found his stride, quite a large chunk of time for such a heavily physical activity, but once he did it was hard to contain the thrill running through him. He always missed this during the periods when he couldn’t get away from his desk enough to train properly and seeing Izuna all worked up and sweaty was just icing on the cake.

When he spotted his opening at last he went for it without hesitation, snapping his fist forward and venting a triumphant “Ha!” at the feeling of his opponent’s nose crumbling under the blow. Izuna’s head snapped backwards and he reeled a few steps before coming to a complete stop, standing utterly still in the middle of a spar with his limbs loose and his nose bleeding.

He looked rather like how Tobirama had described the expression Madara had worn when the two of them first got embroiled in the most fortuitous mess of their lives.

“You broke my nose,” Izuna slurred through the blood and ruined cartilage. Hashirama hummed, incredibly proud of himself and trying not to be too cocky about it just yet.

“So I did.”

“My nose. You broke my nose.”

“I seem to be breaking a lot of your bones today,” Hashirama mused pointedly. “Allow me to heal that for you again.”

Although he was certain he wasn’t meant to see it, the surge of triumph running through his veins was dampened immediately by the way Izuna physically flinched away from the hand he raised, already coating itself with healing chakra. He did his best to pretend he hadn’t seen it, hoping it was little more than the involuntary reaction of a twitchy shinobi.

Neither of them spoke while he reconstructed Izuna’s nose as quickly as he could. Each time Hashirama tried to catch the man’s eyes they quickly looked off in another direction, staring at the trees surrounding them in a manner much too casual to be as innocent as he was trying to appear. Clearly Izuna was avoiding looking at him, although it wasn’t clear why, and Hashirama felt a stone in his gut as he realized that perhaps his offer of courtship was about to be rejected. Had he already been considered and dismissed? Was that what had been bothering Izuna today, the conundrum of how to let him down easily?

It took effort not to curl down to the ground in a miserable ball of sadness at the very thought and the only thing which kept him standing was the attention he was paying to healing what he had broken. Whether or not he hadn’t also broken their budding friendship remained to be seen but he rather hoped not. If Izuna didn’t wish to have him as a partner then Hashirama very much hoped that they could still be friends.

Finally he allowed the glow around his hand to taper off, retracting his chakra from Izuna’s nasal cavities and making one last medical scan before declaring the job done.

“All fixed,” he announced, trying to maintain his cheer. He could do this; he could face rejection bravely. “Does anything still hurt?”

“No,” Izuna mumbled, rocking back on his heels but making no other move to put more distance between them. Hashirama shuffled his weight, peeking up from under his bangs to try one last time to catch the other’s eyes.

Their gazes finally met only for Izuna to flush immediately and look away with a pained expression.

“I see. Ah, if you’re not feeling up to, um, _anything else_ then I would not take offense to ending our, um, exercise. You don’t have to…spar with me anymore.” If he tried very hard, Hashirama wondered if he might physically be able to shove his entire foot in to his mouth. Even the blades of grass at their feet could tell he was speaking about something else. Izuna rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

“Well, it isn’t that I don’t want to, er, spar. Or something. Just…you already have a…sparring partner. So...”

“Eh?” Hashirama blinked, tilting his head to one side.

“You…have a…and I’m not really okay with, er, sparring with someone else’s…partner.”

“Oooooohhhhhhhh!”

Hashirama very nearly laughed with the dizziness as relief swept through him, leaving his knees weak. But he finally understood what the problem was and it was a wonder he hadn’t thought to explain beforehand. Truly his brother was on to something every time Tobirama called him an oblivious dingus.

“You’re worried about Mito!” he said. Izuna flushed deeper, rubbing harder at the back of his neck.

“Well…yeah? You’re _married_. So I’m flattered, I really am, and I can’t say I wouldn’t be interested but–”

“Have you ever heard of polyamory?”

Izuna blinked, frowning a little. “No?”

“Ah. It’s not really something I think of as out of the ordinary because it’s so common in our clan. Actually, Brother’s kind of an odd man out for _not_ being polyamorous. We often enter relationships with multiple partners and it’s not uncommon for more than one of those relationships to culminate in marriage. I do have a wife but…I would also like a husband.” When Izuna’s head snapped up to stare at him with wide eyes, Hashirama offered him a shy smile, hoping his meaning had been clear.

“You…like a harem!?”

“What? No!” Now he did laugh, amused. “I’m in a relationship with Mito. I would also like to be in a relationship with you. My wife is not polyamorous but she understands that I am and she respects the fact that my heart will love other people as well as her.”

“Oh. That’s not something I’ve ever heard of before.”

Fiddling his hands together, Hashirama ventured, “Is it something you think you could be okay with? As I understand it, it isn’t a common practice among the other clans.”

Nerves filled him again while he waited for Izuna to answer, forcing himself to stay quiet and allow the other some time to think. Despite his usual excitability he _was_ capable of reining himself in and being patient when the situation was important – and this situation was incredibly important to him. Izuna’s good opinion of him could be riding on the line.

“Did you break my nose on purpose?”

“Uh…” Hashirama blinked. That wasn’t what he had been expecting after such a long silence. “Yes? That’s how Tobi caught Madara’s attention so I thought maybe it would work for you too.”

Without warning Izuna’s face split with a wide smile, cheeks flushing. “It was an _amazing_ punch,” he breathed, wonder in his eyes and his voice.

“Thank you?”

“No, thank _you_ ,” he insisted. Hashirama laughed.

“You’re welcome, I suppose. Should I give you some time to think about all of this, then? I don’t mind waiting if you need me t-oh!”

His words were cut off as he gave a startled cry, not at all expecting the body which impacted his own so suddenly. A head tucked itself under his chin and Hashirama felt his toes fluttering with delight over the difference in their heights. Izuna was just the perfect size for Hashirama to hold the man close and curl around him.

The two of them stood quietly for a long time, in no hurry to end their embrace. Hashirama buried his nose in Izuna’s hair, not bothering with trying to be discreet as he inhaled a deep lungful of smoke, weapon oil, and the barest hint of sesame. Whatever small fragments of nervousness had been left in him faded away to dust as though he never had a thing to worry about. A hug this tight and this long could hardly mean anything bad for his chances at a positive answer.

“Do you like gyoza?” Izuna’s voice mumbled in to his chest.

“Of course! Who doesn’t?”

“I’ll think about maybe bringing you some gyoza tomorrow, then. I, er, hope you like it extra crispy.”

Hashirama swallowed thickly. “You cook it and I will eat it. Promise.” He felt Izuna nod and burrow closer in to him, both of them shivering just a little.

When Izuna’s head shifted he had to lift his own away to allow the man to peek up at him, almost swooning when he caught sight of the shyly pleased smile waiting for him. Hashirama lifted one of his hands from where it was wrapped tightly around Izuna’s waist to instead caress the beautiful line of his jaw, admiring the softness of his skin.

He watched in awe as the man in his arms took a deep breath before pushing himself up on to his toes, eyes fluttering shut and fingers clenching in the shirt they were gripping.

Their first kiss started gentle and slow, a demure exploration. Since one of them was an Uchiha, however, it wasn’t much of a surprise that things rapidly took a more passionate turn. Before long they had their hands in each other’s hair, tongues sliding together and teeth nipping at each other’s lips. Hashirama wasn’t entirely sure what inspired him to bite down hard enough to draw blood but he very happily swallowed Izuna’s moan of appreciation.

When they broke apart they were both panting and flushed, clutching on to each other like lifelines. After dipping down for one more quick kiss, Hashirama tilted his head to the side to brush his lips against the shell of Izuna’s ear.

“I look forward to any gifts you may see fit to give me,” he said. Izuna quivered against him and drew a shaky breath. “And you can rest assured that I have already put quite a bit of thought in to potential gifts ideas which I might give to you in return.”

“Guh,” Izuna whimpered and Hashirama smirked, pleased with himself.

All of his worrying had been for naught and knowing that everything had turned out just as he hoped it would left him both giddy and impatient. Tobirama could drag things out ‘properly’ all he liked but Hashirama very much intended to bow to Uchiha courting traditions. Married within two weeks didn’t sound too bad to him.

Especially not if it would get Izuna in to his bed that quick. That was definitely a stage in their relationship he was excited to reach.

“Should I allow you to get back to the office?” he asked reluctantly. “You didn’t look like you were able to get much done and it seems that was sort of my fault for distracting you.” A nervous titter escaped him and he offered a sheepish smile, oscillating between emotions as rapidly as he always did. Then his chest gave a happy rumble when Izuna leaned up to press another kiss to the corner of his mouth.

“Absolutely not. Work can wait just a little bit longer. You promised me a spar and – I mean yeah I was nervous about certain _stuff_ but I’ve also been looking forward to it. Maybe you’ll break my nose again!”

“Can I just mention how weird it is that you Uchiha enjoy having your bones broken?” Not that said weirdness stopped Hashirama from being entirely smitten and very willing to participate.

“But it’s so romantic!” Izuna insisted.

Hashirama shook his head, still smiling. “Well then. Let’s see if I can break anything else before we go back to the office.”

When the man almost swooned in his arms the only thing Hashirama could think was that he was so in love he felt his seams might burst open. Izuna was the perfect size with the perfect temperament, the cutest face on top of the cutest butt. The sooner they could be married the sooner Hashirama could stake his claim on that pert little bottom and he could hardly wait to see his family grow. Mito was already excited to have someone else around the house as well.

Although it took them a few minutes to work up the will to detangle their limbs, the two men did eventually separate and put enough space between them to take stance once more, trading expressions of childish glee at the chance to beat each other up to the best of their ability. What could be more romantic – or more fun?

Before they began Hashirama closed his eyes for a moment and slowly filled his lungs. Then he opened then and took in the sight of Izuna awaiting him so eagerly and thought to himself that he couldn’t wait to keep seeing this for the rest of his life.

Even if he had to break every bone in the poor man’s body just to have it.


End file.
